The Wall Against Which Remnant's Darkness Breaks
by Stalkorc
Summary: Max is a veteran titan being trained by Commander Zavala personally. In his 30 years of being a Guardian, Max has seen more than his fair share of crazy in the universe, but a routine mission that takes a not so routine turn will show him he hasn't seen anything yet. (Tentatively rated T for now may change to M depending on how the story goes.)
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:**

 **Hey everyone. So I am a new author and I have always been a huge fan of both RWBY and Destiny since both of them started and I noticed from the beginning the similarities between the two and thought that they would make a good crossover story. I've read a few of the stories others posted on this site and I noticed that the majority of them have their main Destiny characters played by either hunters or warlocks, so I decided to try my hand at this with a titan.**

 **My only request for readers is to keep in mind that this is my first time trying to write anything other than a paper or letter and I'm not an English major so grammar errors are going to happen. I'll do my best to find and correct them, but they're going to happen. Also I would appreciate any and all questions, comments, ideas, and constructive criticism on the story as it progresses. Criticism for the sake of criticism will be ignored. I'm writing this to have fun and hopefully provide an enjoyable read for any that are interested. I welcome and will try to respond as quickly as I can to anyone that offers something that they believe will benefit the story. All that said, let's get on with the story.**

 **For those familiar with the timelines, this story will start post Rise of Iron in Destiny and roughly a few weeks or so before the start of Volume 1 in RWBY.**

 **DISCLAIMER:**

 **I do not own RWBY or Destiny. They are owned by Rooster Teeth and Bungie respectively.**

Chapter 1:

 _Well today could have gone better._ It had been a very routine patrol for Max. It had started as a simple extermination mission, the bread and butter of any titan. Hunters made great scouts and assassins, warlocks were scholars by nature but still knew their way around a weapon and could unleash devastating magics when necessary, but when the fighting got serious; send in the titans. The Cabal had been taking a special interest in the Clovis Bray research facility on Mars and in an unexpected move, the Cabal had made a large push for the facility and pushed the Tower's forces out. Now they had begun to dig in inside one the more remote research sites for some reason. The Vanguard, which served as the operational nerve center for all Guardian operations, had sent hunters in to investigate why the Cabal had pushed so hard for this territory in particular and they had not been able to come up with any reason other than they wanted it for the defensive position that it offered for when they decided to continue their advance in the seemingly endless three-way war that waged between the Vex, the Cabal, and the Guardians. The hunters had been excited for the chance to explore previously ignored territory. The warlocks for their part were itching for a chance to uncover more pre-Collapse secrets from the ancient research center, but first needed the place cleared for their study. Ikora Rey had practically been drooling at the prospect of learning more from the Clovis Bray facilities. Zavala had been livid when he learned of the Cabal's advance. In response he had sent his protégé, Max with his Ghost Spark. If anyone had the courage to challenge the legendary titan commander in his rage, they might have pointed out that Max was likely overkill as a response to the Cabal. It was likely better suited for a less experienced team that needed more missions under their belt. Zavala apparently wanted to send a message to the Cabal that they would not soon forget, so it was decided that Max would be the one to spearhead the effort to reclaim the Clovis Bray facility.

 **[No kidding. I know you've always been prone to weird things, but how you landed us** _ **here**_ **is still beyond me. And I've already run through the events a few dozen times. Best I can say is we have the** _ **worst**_ **luck.]** Max's Ghost, Spark said in his head. "Hey it's not my fault that Cayde's scouts missed this Vex vault here on Mars." Max said in his defense while ducking back behind a wall to avoid the fire from the group of goblins that had marched up to take the place of the four that had just fallen to Max's Shadow Price. Reloading, Max poked his head out again and grinned inside of his helmet as he noticed that the Vex had grouped close together as they tended to. While the intent was to make suppressive fire easier when they lacked the benefit of cover, to Max it was a wordless request for a grenade. The center goblin soon had its wish granted in the form of a magnetic grenade beeping at an increasingly higher frequency and pitch on its chest. A brief moment and two purple, void explosions later there was no evidence that the five goblins that had just blocked the hall ever existed. Max walked deeper into the vault leaving behind the remains of the fight that he had with the Cabal that had been pulled into the vault with him and its Vex defenders.

"And it's definitely not my fault that whatever the Cabal were after here woke up all these Vex. Or that the hydra mind that had been running this place decided to overload the time-gate and pull all of us through into this place rather than just send its soldiers out to our end." Max chuckled and grinned again. "Emphasis on had been." **[Speaking of that hydra, I get that we were in a tight spot at the time, but I really hope that using the Fist of Havoc on that thing's head was worth it. You shattered its mind core and now we may be stuck wherever or whenever we are.]** "Look, I get that it's bad Spark, but we have been through crazy stuff like this before and we haven't explored this whole place yet. In fact, we just got here and this place looks pretty big. Let's make sure we can't find a way out before we start getting pessimistic." Max replied in a more serious tone. "Plus you were transmitting everything to the Tower after we found the Cabal messing with that gate so worst case scenario there should already be a fireteam on its way to activate it again right?" **[Well yes I was transmitting to the Tower, but all of the Vex gates are connected to each other. Meaning anything that passes through one of their gates passes through all of the gates. Which means that even though they know which gate we went in, they won't have any way of knowing which gate we came** _ **out**_ **of because technically there is now a timeline for every gate that we could have come out of.]** Max frowned and slowed his pace a bit. "So we're on our own here then. Fine we can handle this. We work best on our own anyway. This just means that we can't rely on anyone breaking us out of here and we need to find our own way out." Max said in his all-business tone. **[I don't understand how you manage to remain so positive.]** "One of us has to." Max replied dryly as he continued deeper into the vault and encountered a few other small patrols of goblins that were all quickly dealt with. About an hour of exploring later, Max came through a high archway out into a huge, cylindrical room with the largest time gate that he had ever seen before at the center. Like all of the other gates the surface of the portal had an almost fluid like surface that appeared to be as flat as lake that had not experienced a breeze across its surface in ages.

"Woah, this thing could send Vex anywhere dozens at a time. And they just let us get here with almost no resistance? Can't help but wonder why they would do that. I would have thought they'd try to keep us from it, rather than practically invite us here." Max questioned. As soon as Max finished his question, dark lightning clouds appeared all around the large cylindrical room that housed the hundred-meter tall gate. At the same time a massive door that Max had not noticed in the archway he had passed through slammed shut. **[You had to say it.]** Spark deadpanned. The maelstrom around the room grew more and more violent as the Vex began to appear out of them. Over a dozen minotaurs teleported into the room, each with five goblins, three hobgoblins, and eight harpies around them.

 **[They let us get here with no resistance he says!]** Spark shouted in Max's head. **[It could send dozens of Vex anywhere he says! You'd think they'd guard it he says! If we make it out of this alive, I might kill you myself for jinxing us like this.]** "Yeah well get in line apparently." Max said worriedly as the Vex began turning slowly and menacingly arming their weapons. "Any ideas on getting us out of here?" **[Just one, and you won't like it.]** "Don't say it." Max pleaded while chambering the first round in his Shadow Price auto rifle and a minotaur issued a challenging screech and pointed at Max. The other Vex in the room issued the same screech in answer and all hell broke loose as the Vex collectively began firing at Max. **[Get me near the gate! We might be able to use this thing to get out of here.]** "You said it." Max said dejectedly as he began dodging Vex fire as best he could and returning fire with his rifle and throwing grenades where he could.

Max knew from experience that the goblins' rapid fire slap rifles presented only a minor threat to his heavy armor, but the harpies' wielding three of them at once would melt through fairly quickly if they were able to focus on one specific part of his armor. The minotaurs and hobgoblins on the other hand were much more dangerous. The hobgoblins' charging line rifles would pierce Max's armor in two shots or if he was lucky three, and the minotaurs' heavy void cannons would tear his armor apart in short order on a direct hit.

Max's attention was focused on avoiding the fire of the minotaur cannons and at least making the hobgoblins' shots glancing blows as he proved that any titan worth their weight in spit was deceptively agile and could move just as fast in their armor as they could out of it. As Max charged towards the massive time gate, he suddenly cut to his left towards a goblin that unknowingly got too close and sent his right fist through its chest. Spinning on his heel and completing his counter-clockwise turn to send him back on track after the gate, Max's Light Barrier recharged from the energy Max drained from the goblin as it disintegrated into nothing around his forearm. Max had mastered all three paths of the titans but it was times like these that he really appreciated the robust protection that the Defender's void arsenal provided.

Trusting his Barrier, Max stopped trying to confuse the Vex's targeting systems and poured all of the energy that he had into sprinting to the side of the gate so Spark could work whatever plan he had. Max's Barrier failed right as he came skidding to a halt next to the gate and felt Spark leave his mind. "Spark get to work. I won't be able to hold them off for very long." Max ordered as he sprayed rounds from is rifle over a pair of hobgoblins to force them into their protective stasis fields. As soon as they entered stasis, Max hurled another magnetic grenade onto the closest minotaur roughly 10 meters away. "I'm already on it. I just need to find somewhere safe and mess with gate so the Vex can't follow us through." Spark called out. The minotaur ignored the grenade, trusting its void shield to protect it from the blast and continued to fire at Max who barely managed to duck under the blast in time. The first blast of the grenade stripped the minotaur of its shield and it screeched angrily at the titan as a pair of harpies quickly flew in front of the minotaur and expanded their triangular bodies to effectively shield it from further harm. Fortunately, Max had been hoping for exactly that as the void energy that had exploded form the grenade came back into the sphere shape of the grenade and detonated again, blasting the minotaur's chest open and throwing it back onto a, goblin crushing it. The harpies that had tried to protect the minotaur were consumed by the blast before they could begin to open fire.

Max brought his rifle fire back across the first two hobgoblins as they exited their protective fields, killing them before they could bring their weapons to bear again. Max turned back to face the way that he had come from only to immediately take a heavy void blast from a minotaur to the chest. Max was nearly knocked clean off of his feet from the blast and based off of the intense burning on his chest, his armor had barely saved him from the blast and another would definitely prove fatal. Acting on instinct, Max threw himself to his right and crashed his shoulder into the wall of the gate to get out of the way of the virtual wall of death the Vex had collectively fired upon seeing him stagger. Max could barely make out the sound of Spark cursing to himself and Max knew he needed to buy his Ghost more time. Channeling all of the void energy that he could through his body, Max set his feet shoulder width a part and bent his knees into an athletic stance while at the same time spreading his arms out to his greatest wingspan and summoned his Ward of Dawn. Max gave a loud, defiant yell as his Ward went up around him and Spark. Max continued to pour his void Light into the Ward until he was certain that the Vex would not be able to break through anytime soon. Max sighed tiredly and stood up to allow himself a short reprieve from battle and his Light time to repair the damage to his armor and body.

"Spark, hurry up. This Ward can only last for so long." Max said in a calmer but still worried voice. "I'm working as fast as I can but it's like the gate itself is fighting my commands and there is also the matter of preventing the Vex from following us through the gate." Spark replied more annoyed at the complications than Max rushing him. "Just buy me five minutes." Spark said focusing on the giant time gate again. "You've got three." Max replied as he reloaded his Shadow Price mag locking it to his back and focused his Light into summoning his heavy machine gun, Thunderlord. "Hello old friend. Ready to go to work?" Max said with a half-smile to the weapon as he felt his Light finish healing him. Outside the Ward, the Vex had surrounded the Guardian and Ghost in a semicircle and laid siege to the Ward as they slowly marched toward the duo. After nearly a minute of sustained fire it was clear that despite the all of the firepower they could bring to bear, Max's Ward stood resolute. The Vex stopped firing upon seeing that their weapons were having no effect and one goblin stepped up and put a hand on the Ward in an attempt to walk through it only to quickly recoil in pain. Unlike most other titans' Ward of Dawn, Max could focus his Light to allow only those that were attuned to his Light to pass through. With renewed rage the Vex once again began firing at Max's Ward, this time focusing all of their fire at the point the goblin's hand had touched the Ward.

Max smirked having anticipated the Vex's decision to focus their fire, he had previously reinforced that area with his void Light. "Come on Spark!" Max shouted straining his Light against the Vex. "Almost done. I think I found Earth now I just need to prevent them from following us." Spark replied. Suddenly Max felt the Vex stop attacking his Ward and heard a sound that made his heart sink. Apparently they had decided to cut their losses by destroying the gate and wait out Max's Ward of Dawn. The metal structure was not meant to withstand any kind of attack. And the frame groaned as support struts began to melt and snap from the Vex fire. "Spark tell me you have a destination locked 'cause we need to go now!" Max yelled as the almost liquid looking surface of the portal made by the time gate began to ripple with each impact on the gate's frame. "I think but I just need a few more seconds to make I sure narrow down the coordinates." Spark said not noticing that Max had dropped his Ward in an attempt to draw the Vex's attention back to himself instead of the gate. "You don't have them." Max forced out as he focused all of his energy into sprinting towards the entrance of the gate. Max roughly grabbed Spark out of the air, not even giving him a chance to meld back into Max's Light, with his left hand as he passed and held him close to his chest to protect the Ghost from any stray Vex shots. Half of the Vex refocused their attention on the titan once again as he attempted to make his escape. The remaining Vex continued to shoot the gate in an attempt to cut off the duo's escape.

The gate's frame cracked and the surface of the portal began to shrink toward the center of the circle. Max tucked Spark, who had started screaming from the surprise of being grabbed out the air, into the crook of his left arm like a football and leapt as high as he could and used his Lift to continue his upward movement. "Wait, wait, wait!" Spark yelled to deaf ears. The surface of the portal continued to rapidly shrink and Max had to tuck himself into a ball around Spark to ensure that he could fit through. Just as Max began to make it through the portal a minotaur cannon round slammed into the back of his head and sent him into an uncontrolled forward tumble through the portal.

As they left the Vex trap behind onto whatever world Spark had found Max's dazed mind was only able to notice the shades of green and blue that flew by nauseatingly fast. _Oh Traveler, I'm going to puke!_ The blues and greens began to blend together as they whipped past his vision and Max was barely able to realize that his vision had shifted from mostly blue with a bit of green to mostly green with a bit of blue. Had he not been so dazed from the minotaur's blast he might have realized that he was about to hit the ground in an armored ball at almost terminal velocity. He might have been able to use his Lift to regain control of his flight but it was already a miracle that he was conscious enough to notice he was no longer in the vault. Max felt a bone-jarring impact that was his back hitting the ground. The only thing that Max could think do was tuck himself further into a ball as tightly as he could and pray that he didn't have to find out if his battered armor was stronger than one these tree trunks. As Max bounced and rolled across the ground he thought that he saw a flash of black amongst the colors of the forest going by. _Was that a bird? Is this a forest?_ Max thought as he left a furrow in the ground a meter and a half wide and almost forty meters long.

Max ended up on his back barely clinging to consciousness and finally allowed Spark to break free of his grip. "Oh crap." Spark said out loud to no one in particular as Max finally lost consciousness. _He is going to be_ so pissed _when he wakes up._ Spark thought to himself as he realized that the coordinates that he had entered into the gate had _not_ been Earth. In his defense the Vex's method of sorting data and coordinates was really strange and based mainly off of images and what he had seen looked very much like Earth. Spark looked out at the surrounding forest and had pretty good idea of Max's first few questions when he awoke. Earth was too ravaged by war to have any forest like this still standing and almost all animal life had been lost in the war. So either this forest and the bird circling overhead were way out of place or they were.

 **A/N:**

 **Well there we go guys, our heroes (plural because what's a Guardian without Ghost?) find themselves battered and lost on some unknown planet and the wildlife has already been agitated by their arrival. A big thank you to all that took the time to read this. Again any and all comments, questions, thoughts, suggestions, and constructive criticisms are welcomed and I will try to reply to them as best I can. Hopefully I will be able to write a new chapter every few days but life happens so the only promise that I can make is that the update rate that I am aiming for. I do have a question for you guys, I want to get a feel for good chapter lengths. Was this a good length, longer, shorter? I'd appreciate you letting me know. Anyways I hope to have another chapter up in a few days. Until then, peace.**

 **-Stalkorc**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:**

 **So I know that I left the last chapter a bit of a cliffhanger and trust me I love to hate them as a reader but I already find myself incapable of using them as an author. I really appreciate all of the positive feedback I have gotten on the story so far. It feels really great to know that you enjoy it. Once again any and all questions, comments, thoughts, and suggestions are welcome.** **Also I just wanted to clarify something:**

 **[This is Spark speaking in Max's head.]**

"This is Spark speaking out loud for anyone in earshot to hear."

 **DISCLAIMER:**

 **I do not own RWBY or Destiny. They are owned by Rooster Teeth and Bungie respectively.**

Chapter 2: First Contact

Pain. That was all there was. Everything hurt. His back hurt. His arms hurt. His legs hurt. _At least I'm alive._ Max thought, then immediately winced as he became aware of what was likely the worst headache of his life. That slight motion was enough to inform Max that he could probably count one hand the ribs that weren't broken. "Three in case you were wondering. I took the liberty of healing the worst of your injuries since then I've been working on finding out what I could about this place." Spark said as he appeared to Max's right hovering a meter above the grass Max was laying in. "Gee thanks." Came Max's humorless response as he grit his teeth and forced himself onto his knees and eventually his feet.

 _That is the role of every titan._ Max could practically here Zavala say. _To stand where all others would fall and to prove to the enemy that all they have is not enough. As long as you're standing you're surviving._ Max often looked back on his mentor's teachings in times of need and in the years he had spent under Zavala's tutelage, he must have heard that quote more times than even Spark could count.

Max focused his Light on his injuries and started some light stretches until he felt comfortable enough to start moving again. "How long was I out?" Max asked as he began inspecting his armor. It had obviously taken the brunt of the impact and would definitely take longer to repair than himself; but seeing that he wasn't getting shot right now, Max decided he could work on that in a moment. "About an hour." Spark replied while looking around the clearing he and Max had landed in. "I'd have given you more time to sleep that impact off, but what little info I've been able to gather suggest that there is something very wrong about this place." Spark said spinning back to face his Guardian. "About that." Max said in a neutral tone. "Where are we? This place doesn't look like any I recognize from Earth."

Spark sighed. He really didn't want to have this conversation, at least not yet. "I honestly don't know. This place isn't in any of the City's databanks. Even the Vex records don't have much on this planet beyond its location and size. Considering that construct that was in the gate had kept trying to send us all over the place instead of just some gate in some forgotten hole somewhere, I think that they were working on using that gate to send things to places where there wasn't another gate on the other side and we made great test subjects. At least I kept that construct from sending us to this planet's core like it kept trying to." Looking around, Max had to admit to that this place did look quite peaceful. But they still had a job to do. They needed to find a way to at least get a message back to the Tower and report what had happened. The Vex had built a staging area in that vault on Mars and once they finished repairing the damage it sustained, they would use it to launch massive assaults anywhere.

"I'm just glad we got out of there alright, but we need to find a way to deal with that place for good." If Ghosts could smile Spark would be grinning ear to ear. He had been expecting Max to be upset for his error. Max tended to be a bit of a perfectionist, especially when on missions, a fact that Spark blamed entirely on Zavala's training. "I wouldn't be too worried about that if I were you." Spark said with a cheeky tone. Max just glared at him through his helmet. "What did you do?" He asked accusingly with a bit of humor in his voice. "Well you know how you always say not to go digging in files when we're getting shot at?" "Yes" Max answered annoyed at how many times Spark's curious nature had nearly or cost them a mission. "Well turns out I ignored that. You know like always. And it also turns out that gate had this program strangely named 'self-destruct'" Spark said smugly. "And this nifty little program had a command called 'activate'. I can only imagine what they were for, but if I had to guess, I'd say that they saw whatever it did all the way back at the Tower." Spark finished proud of himself.

Max had been prepared to be upset with Spark for ignoring him again, but could only chuckle and shake his head slightly at Spark's story. "That doesn't mean that I won't use you for a football the next time your curiosity almost gets my head blown off. Good work. I guess that just means that we need to get back in contact with the Tower, find our ride, and get home." At this Spark bobbed in the air and sent his gaze slightly towards the ground before coming to look back at Max's visor. "Max, that may be a lot harder than you make it sound. I haven't been able to detect the Traveler's Light since we came out of that portal. And I've tried every secure Guardian channel with no response. There wasn't even static, just nothing. I don't know where we are but we are well outside anywhere we've been able to map." Max froze. Spark couldn't feel the Traveler? He didn't even know that there was a maximum range that a Ghost could feel its Light. And they were beyond that? His ship would still be in orbit above Mars. What would they do now?

"-should head that way." Max shook his head to clear his thoughts and noticed an objective marker had appeared on his HUD indicating a point several kilometers away and Spark was facing that direction. "What? Sorry I missed that." Spark turned back to his Guardian. To any observer Max was just standing in a comfortable stance, but when you spend years inside someone's head, you learn there tells. Max had been floored by Spark's inability to feel the Traveler, and needed some hope, some objective, something, to focus his mind on. Luckily Spark had exactly what his Guardian needed. "I said I can't quite make out what it is, but there is a large gathering of Light off to the West. It's odd though. Not like what the Fallen use, it's still more similar to the Last City's Light, just different. I can't explain it but I think we should head that way." Max shook his head more firmly this time and seemed much better now that he had a clear objective to focus on. "Alright we'll head that way and see what's going on. Hopefully there will be some kind of civilization there that will be willing to help us get home, but that's an extreme best case scenario. At least we're not alone out here."

Mas turned to face in the direction of the waypoint that spark had given him. "Well wherever we're going looks to be a fair ways out and I don't think that the sparrow is going to fit through those trees so I guess its best we start making our way there." Max felt Spark in his head again. **[I'm with you.]** Max chuckled. "Now what I do to get ri-" something flashed briefly on the outer edge of his motion tracker. "What was that?" Max asked more startled than anything. His motion tracker was tuned for roughly human sized objects. Anything much smaller than the average eight year-old wouldn't set it off. **[I don't know. I detect Darkness here but nothing stifling that would prevent me from reviving you.]** _Thanks for the vote of confidence._ Max thought back sarcastically. Max went for his rifle then decided against it realizing it could just be one of the natives that had come to investigate Max's landing. He was already an armored extraterrestrial. Being an armed one also would only make it harder to gain the trust of the planet's potentially non-hostile population.

"Hello? Is anyone there?" Max called out as non-threateningly as he could and took a few cautious steps toward the direction that his motion tracker had triggered. The tracker stayed silent. Whatever had triggered it had either run off or was staying low. Max slowly raised his hands in front of his chest with his palms out and his fingers splayed as he continued toward the edge of the clearing. "I mean you no harm." Max said as he decided honesty was the way to go in this case if it was one of the natives. "I'm lost and looking for civilization. Please if you could help me, I would appreciate it." Max added as he reached the edge of the clearing.

Max decided that whoever had triggered the tracker was long gone by now and dropped his arms. He had barely taken three steps when his motion tracker triggered to his left, this time very close. Max whipped around just in time to see… a werewolf? flying at him from where it had been hiding in the brush. It had spiked bone-like protrusions down its back and forearms, legs that looked they could store a lot of power for leaps like these, as well claws and what looked like a mask that appeared to be made of the same bone material, but it was the creature's burning red eyes that stuck out the most to Max. The creature's jaws were open and prepared to deliver a vicious bite and its right arm was cocked back to deliver a blow in case its jaws could not find their mark. Max moved in a way that the creature had not been expecting if the surprised yelp it gave was any indication. Rather than stepping back or to the side to escape the creature's bite in a way that would still leave Max vulnerable to its claws as it had expected him to, Max stepped forward to meet the creature at the apex of its jump. Max's left hand grabbed the creature by the neck and pulled down. At the same time his right fist went into the creature's stomach, flipping it over Max as he used both hands to slam it into the ground earning a pained whine from the creature. Max mounted the thing using his limbs to trap the creature's against the ground. Once it was clear the creature wasn't going anywhere until Max let it, Spark appeared to Max's right. "Scanning." A blue wave of light shot out of Spark's eye as he scanned the creature. "It's non-sentient and steeped in darkness. If we're trying to make friends with the locals where we're going, I doubt they'll miss this thing." Spark said quickly as the creature tried to bite Max who just pulled his head back out of reach. "That's all I need to hear. "Max replied as he quickly pulled his right hand back and sent his fist through the creature's skull. As soon as it died the creature began to evaporate with a slight hissing sound. "What the?" Max questioned and looked at Spark. "I don't know maybe we'll learn more when we get to the city" was Spark's reply. "Hopefully." Max started walking again. The objective wasn't getting any closer.

Max walked for about an hour and it appeared to be the beginning of evening he had made it nearly halfway to his objective. **[I've managed to figure out a little bit about this place.]** _What have you got?_ Max thought back. He had not been attacked again by any creatures but he didn't want to alert any that might be lurking around. **[Well apparently this place isn't so different from Earth. While the vast majority of people live in four main cities there are plenty of secluded villages around each city. We are heading to is Vale. It also seems to be the closest settlement even counting the villages. That's good for us seeing as far as I can tell Vale's government would be the least likely to "shoot first and ask questions later" as you say. That thing you fought a while back was called a "Creature of Grimm". They appear to be the reason that the most successful settlements are the ones with natural borders and defenses, and why so many attempts at expansion have failed. The defenders of each kingdom are called hunters.]** _Great._ Max said rolling his eyes. _Just what I need._ Spark laughed at Max's joke. **[Nothing like that, but they do seem to dress… vibrantly. I think that's because in the event their called in to protect a settlement, it's supposed to make the Grimm will focus on them rather than the civilians.]** _Makes sense I guess._ **[Well if you like that then you'll get a kick out of their weapons. Seriously you should see some of these.]** _What do you mean? What could possibly be so special about them? Do they all have smart-tracking or something?_ Max asked picturing a line of weapons based off the Truth rocket launcher. **[No it's nothing like that. The weapons are fully capable of missing… it's just everything… and I mean** _ **Everything**_ **is also a gun.]** _What, you mean like how Boltcaster can shoot electricity?_ **[Look just name a melee weapon and I'll tell you the most common ranged weapon I can find it paired with.]** _Fine. Sword._ Max thought rolling his eyes. There was just no way people were just tossing a sword and an assault rifle on a heart shaped bed and coming back nine months later to what? A cute little pistol that had a bayonet on it? Max's suppressed his laughter at the thought. Spark was pulling his leg. **[Pistol, typically housed in the guard oh ye of little faith.]** What!? _Hammer?_ **[Grenade launcher.]** _Poleaxe?_ **[Assault rifle.]** Spark was starting to sound intentionally bored just to rub it in. Irked, Max thought he had an idea that could stump his smart-aleck Ghost. _Brass knuckles?_ **[Shotguns.]** Max just face-palmed then suddenly brought both of his hands in front of him. _How can I get a set of those?_ **[Oh no. Absolutely not. If you get that then it becomes a slippery slope that ends with you getting a baseball bat that turns into a rocket launcher, and yes I'm seriously looking at a picture of one right now. Apparently they're a favorite of some small time mob bosses.]** Max had stopped listening to his Ghost. Hopefully the weapon shops around here took glimmer as payment.

By the time night had finally fallen Max had made it to the Vale's gates and been surprised to find them open with a couple guard post posts station at both sides watching for Grimm. _I guess they're more worried about a Grimm invasion than an alien one._ Other than a few odd glances at the imposing figure Max cut he was able to move fairly unnoticed through Vale thanks to Spark using some of Max's glimmer to create some civilian clothes. They were nothing extravagant just a simple white T-shirt with a symbol that had two axe heads crossed in the middle of a circle on the chest and a pair of basic blue jeans. Max found himself a bit uncomfortable without his armor. It wasn't that he was expecting to need it, he had just come to practically live in it and to be forced to wear something so drastically different in an environment that was so full of unknowns didn't sit right with him. _I still think it would have been fine if you had just let me have a sidearm._ **[You stand a head and shoulders taller than anyone else here, your shoulders are so broad you barley fit through any doors without turning at an angle, and not to mention you've got more muscle on you than three of any of these people combined. Trust me when I say they're more afraid of you than you are of them. Besides where I'm taking us, I get the feeling you being armed will just send the wrong message.]** _So where exactly_ are _we going you never said other than it would be a good idea for us to head there first._ **[It's called Junior's Club. It's where a few shadier folk hang out but it should be a good place for a bit of info on the area, provided you play nice and** _ **don't**_ **walk in there, guns blazing.]** _Fine how much further then?_ **[It should be just down the-]** Whatever Spark was going to say was cut off by what sounded like a bomb going off in the building at the end of the street. A bright light could be seen through the windows just before they were all blasted out by the shockwave of whatever had gone off inside.

Max started running to see what had happened but took cover in an alley when he noticed that someone had been ejected from the second story window and landed roughly in front of a teenage girl? She must have been one of the hunters that Spark had mentioned based on the bright red hood and cape that she wore or at least training to be one. She couldn't be more than 16. Another figure suddenly came out of the same window as the first. Her flight seemed to be far more controlled than the flight of the man groaning at the feet of the first girl. The newcomer's method of dress was far more _revealing_ than the first girl's but what stood out most to Max was her waist length blonde hair that had the visual effect of being on fire and her blood red eyes. _Not someone to piss off if nothing else._ The two girls had apparently started some conversation that was too far for Max to hear and the blonde already seemed significantly calmer if her eyes changing from red to lilac meant anything. Max left his cover and started jogging to the pair, deciding he would play the concerned passerby. "What happened? Is everyone ok?" He asked. Max had been approaching slightly behind the redhead so the blonde had noticed him first. Whatever Max had been expecting it certainly wasn't for the blonde to quickly sidestep the redhead and set her feet in an obvious fighter's stance with her left arm outstretched protectively between Max and the younger girl and her right hand raised in a halting gesture. Max had no intention of starting a fight and came to a stop roughly three meters from the pair. "Nothing to see here buddy. Just an idiot that doesn't know how to treat a lady." The blonde said nudging the man on the ground to her right with her knee high boot, earning a pained groan from the man. **[At least her eyes aren't red.]** _Shut up._ "Yang." The redhead drawled in a slightly warning tone. "He's not threatening us so why are you threatening him?" The redhead continued cheerily as she pushed past the older girl's arm and walked right up to Max with her right hand offered. Max shook it politely still somewhat unsure how to respond to the pair.

"Sorry about my sister, she gets overprotective. I'm Ruby." "Max. Pleasure to meet you." "So do you go to Beacon? Yang just got accepted and I'm going to apply as soon I graduate from Signal. I only asked because I noticed your shirt. They only send those to people who got accepted into Beacon. In fact Yang only just got hers in the mail last week." Max just blinked his eyes in response. He had just met this girl and she was talking like they had known each other for years? _Wait why would I go to this Beacon? It has to be some school for kids right?_ **[Has it really been so long since you looked in the mirror without your helmet dummy? You were about 19 when you died so that's how you look.]** If Spark could have hit Max on the back of the head without being detected he would have. **[Just say yes for now.]** _What? Why?_ **[Trust me, just do it. I kinda get the feeling that Junior won't be much help. Besides they're expecting you to at least say something.]** Ruby had stared on expectantly apparently used to people needing a moment to compose their thoughts after one of her verbal onslaughts. Yang for her part had adopted a far less aggressive stance and moved to stand to the right of her sister with her arms crossed in a relaxed manner. "Yes I've been accepted into Beacon, but I'm a bit of a special case due to my age." _I hope you know what you're doing._ "I don't mean to be rude ladies but I do have somewhere that I need to be. Enjoy the rest of your evening." Max decided it was time to get out of there before they started asking more questions. He started walking to his left down the street. "Oh. Ok. Maybe we'll see you around." Ruby called after him.

 **[Smooth.]** Spark said sarcastically in Max's head after he had rounded another corner and left the pair behind him. **[Take a right up here. I think I found a good little motel for you to crash tonight.]** _Spark I have absolutely no money to my name here. For that matter I have no idea what they even use for money here. How could you have possibly found a motel that will take me in with no money._ **[It'll be fine just mention to the owner that even though you don't have money you don't want the** _ **discount rate**_ **that he has offers to a lot of his female tenants whenever his wife isn't looking. I think he'll find your silence worth a few nights stay.]** _How do you- actually I don't want to know how you learn the things that you do._ As it turned out the landlord found Max's silence _very_ valuable and grudgingly offered Max an indefinite free stay. Max would only need the one night though. Apparently Spark had somewhere for him to be in the morning. Maybe Max was more tired than he thought be he could have sworn during the whole conversation that the owner had deer antlers. Then again the sign up front had them too, so maybe it was just some stupid gimmicky hat or this place was even stranger than he thought.

 **A/N:**

 **Sorry guys that this took so long to finish. Life is very good at getting in the way of writing. I should be able to get chapters out more frequently now though so hopefully you won't have to wait so long. As always thoughts, comments, and suggestions are welcome. Until next time.**

 **-Stalkorc**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:**

 **Hey all, so sorry that it has taken me this long to update. My computer crapped out on me and it took longer than anticipated to get it fixed. Good news is that the problem's fixed now so it shouldn't take me so long to get updates out for the foreseeable future.**

 **DISCLAIMER:**

 **I do not own RWBY or Destiny. They are owned by Rooster Teeth and Bungie respectively.**

Chapter 3: A Simple Meeting

Max laid on his bed in the hotel that he and Spark had recently moved into. What was the place called again? Ererra? Something like that. It wasn't much but it was much better than that cesspool that the other place had been. Max was surprised that people were paying to stay there instead of the other way around. In the two weeks since they had arrived, Max and spark had learned plenty about the planet that they now knew was called Remnant. The faunas were people that shared a specific trait with an animal, such as ears, tails, and the like. Apparently prejudiced humans were not unique to Earth and the faunas people were treated as second class citizens. This mistreatment had led to a war some hundred years ago that had led to the world granting rights and status equal to humans. Unfortunately even though the laws had changed, the majority of people's minds had not and faunas were still treated poorly basically everywhere. The continued mistreatment had given birth to the faunas rights movement that called itself the White Fang. It had started as a peaceful protest group that had slowly started to make a change. There were however members that must not have been seeing enough change. Recently the White Fang had turned violent. They had become killers that attacked establishments with anti-faunas practices. One of the White Fang's most common targets was the Schnee Dust Company, the largest provider of an elemental accelerant known as Dust, had earned a nasty reputation for using faunas as practically slave labor. Spark had learned that Dust in the refined form it was sold in could be converted to the programmable matter glimmer which could in turn be converted into any form of supplies Max might need, including Lien, the currency on Remnant so that had at least worked out in their favor. If nothing happened with the White Fang then Remnant had another civil war in the not-so-distant future. The worst part about it was they had a fair point but a terrible approach to solving the problem. Max's current view on the issue was that he wasn't even on Remnant intentionally let alone to solve its political problems. Of course if Max was here for the long haul, which was looking very likely seeing that this planet hadn't even managed to send a probe into space yet, forget having a fleet of strike craft capable of traveling from Mercury to Saturn in minutes, then it was possible that the growing tensions could begin to become his problem.

Max had more immediate problems though. The most prominent being this Qrow character. Three days ago the drunk had somehow tracked Max to his hotel room in the short time that they had been here. Max had quickly got the impression that despite his age and apparent constant drunken state, there was yet to be a soul that had underestimated him and lived to tell the tale. According to Qrow, the headmaster of Beacon academy, Professor Ozpin, had ordered Qrow to request a meeting with Max tomorrow. Request? Rather than arrange a meeting, Ozpin had requested a meeting like Max had some kind of choice. It was at least clear that Qrow, and likely Ozpin as well had some notion that Max was not the image of an average citizen that he was trying to give off. What game then was Ozpin playing when he had to know that he was holding all the cards here? Spark had reasoned that Ozpin appeared to be willing to hear them out and was obviously a powerful man. Refusing to meet him would likely only result in problems for them. And if Ozpin was willing to have an open mind during the conversation they might make an ally out of him. There had never been any choice in the matter at all it had seemed. Max was still not quite comfortable walking into the heart of Beacon surrounded by armed students and teachers while he would be unarmed. He knew that he had nothing really to fear and the logic behind going in unarmed was unquestionable, still the soldier in him that Zavala had trained didn't like not at least having a sidearm. These people weren't hostiles yet and there was no sense in giving them a reason to be. _A guardian that does not prepare himself for all possibilities is a guardian lost._ Max could hear another of Zavala's favorite sayings in his head. Max would need his wits about him when he met Ozpin. He needed to sleep. Max got out of bed and did a few light stretches to help clear his head then laid back down where sleep quickly claimed him.

The next morning Max had arrived on Beacon's grounds early. His meeting with Ozpin was not scheduled until 09:30 and he had found himself sitting on one Beacon's many courtyard benches thoroughly enjoying the view at 08:30. While views from the Tower back home were certainly peaceful when one found the time and a secluded area, Max had to admit they were nothing compared to what was before him. Beacon's grounds were beautiful. The academy itself could only be described as a castle fit for a king, from the old romantic stories of knights in shining armor. The surrounding buildings were all modeled after the same style as the main building except for the spire at the center of campus. The massive clock tower that could be seen from anywhere in Vale made it clear where the school had gotten its name. The tower itself was painted a dark grey with bright green clock face at the top and some the most intricate stained glass art along the walls all the way to the top. Not to mention that interspersed throughout the grounds, Beacon had several gardens some even had shallow ponds with mesmerizingly tranquil surfaces. Max may have missed his home and they view of the Traveler, but true peace was never felt there. There was always some new threat, some new emergency that popped up before anyone could truly begin relax. Max could enjoy this peace forever. It felt good to know that the peace that Guardians fought so hard for could at least be found _somewhere._ Max felt his spirits raise higher than they had in years knowing that this kind of peace could be achieved. He had felt something like this plenty of times back at the Tower, but never to this extent before. It felt good. **[I know you're enjoying the view, but we need to start making our way to the clock tower if we want to be on time.]** Spark's voice rang in Max's head far too soon for his liking. Oh well there would be time to enjoy the view later, they were here for a reason not to sightsee.

Max sighed "Alright guess it's time to head out. Wouldn't look good to keep the headmaster waiting." Max said appearing to be talking to himself as he acknowledged his Ghost. Max was wearing his t-shirt and jeans outfit as he moved toward the academy's namesake. Max reached the base of the tower and once inside queued the elevator and began waiting patiently. **[Is that Ruby?]** _What are you talking about? She said she had two more years until-_ "Max! Hey, Max! What's up?" Max was able to pick out where the voice was coming from up ahead in the mass of students going to and from class. **[Told you.]** Ruby was dressed in the school's official dress uniform, but apparently they were offered some customization as she still wore her cape with the hood down. How she had seen him before he had seen her was a mystery to Max as she really stuck out with that cape. "Ruby? I'm happy to see you but I thought you said it would be a couple years before you even applied here. What are you doing here?" Max said in a friendly voice as he prayed to the Traveler that the elevator would get here quickly. He had nothing against the girl, but whether she knew it or not Ruby had a tendency to ask questions that were difficult to answer. He needed to get his story straight with Ozpin before he could let her get too deep into her inevitable questions. _I should try to keep the conversation focused on her._ Ruby for her part had a hint of an embarrassed blush on her and chuckled lightly to herself. "Well it turns out when you help prevent an armed Dust robbery right in front of the headmaster they let you skip a couple grades. The first years finished initiation yesterday, but I'm sure that you already knew that. I wasn't expecting them to show the footage to the upper levels." "Must be so nobody gets a big head. You know show everybody that everyone earned their place here, especially you apparently seeing as you already had a highlight reel before initiation." Max said jokingly. Ruby seemed oddly down at that. "I guess so I'm not so sure I was good enough to be made leader of team though, and let's just say that I'm not the only one on my team who feels that way." The elevator announced its arrival to Max's right. Max felt for the girl. He knew her position. A large part of why Max worked alone was because he worked better when he did not have the additional pressure of leading a team to deal with, and he had never had to deal with teammates that had questioned his leadership. Ruby didn't even have the option of going solo like Max. "Well it has only been one day since initiation I would suggest you at least wait a bit more time before you start questioning Ozpin's faith in you. I have to get to a meeting with Ozpin but you'll do fine. Just keep doing what you've been doing and you'll prove yourself to your team the same way you proved yourself to Ozpin." Max smiled as the elevator doors closed between them.

 **[Where did that come from?]** Spark asked **[I didn't know Zavala also trained you to help deal with teenage insecurities.]** Of course Spark would never miss the opportunity to tease his Guardian. Max just rolled his eyes. "It wasn't anything so different from times when some fresh Guardians needed a bit of inspiring. The only difference was apparently she already has proved herself it's just time for a few others to accept that even though she's younger she's on their level. By the way I suggest you let me do the talking for the start of this conversation. If all goes way you can reveal yourself later but let's play it cautious to start." **[Fine by me.]**

The elevator opened at the top floor to a fairly empty room. The floor and ceiling appeared to be made of clear glass that showed the innerworkings of the clock tower they were currently inside. All of the walls were also made of glass to provide a view of the entire academy and there also appeared to be a balcony facing toward the main courtyard and the rest of Vale beyond. The only furniture in the room was a large desk decorated to match the clockwork decorations in the rest of the room that it appeared more like it had grown out of the floor than it had been placed in there. Two chairs sat side by side with their backs to the elevator, presumably for visitors. A third chair facing the opposite direction of the first housed the room's only occupant. Ozpin had silver hair, green eyes, and an equally green scarf and shirt underneath a black jacket. "Welcome young man. I'm glad that you agreed to with me today." Ozpin said with a polite and patient smile. Max nearly missed the critical eye that he was being judged with as he approached the desk. "Please have a seat, there's no reason for you to just stand there when I feel that we have what promises to be a lengthy conversation ahead of us. I must say from what little Qrow has been able to tell me about you I am interested in getting to know you mister?" "Max will work just fine, and with all due respect headmaster I would prefer to stand." Max replied as he moved to stand between the two chairs with his hands clasped behind his back. "Indeed." Ozpin replied with a knowing smile as if he had been expecting that from the titan then sat patiently waiting for Max to start. "I suspect that you have questions for me headmaster? I'm sure it's not every day that someone that has no previous connection to your school is invited to speak with you." Max said trying to get the headmaster started on why he had contacted Max. "You would be correct in that assumption. However it is also not every day that someone with no identifiable history to speak of falls from the sky, lands like you did and stands back up like you did, so I must ask you to forgive my curiosity as to just who are you?" _Alright so he knows about all that huh?_ Max sighed _There's no explaining this away except with the truth._ Ozpin waited patiently for Max to compose his thoughts.

Well the jig was up. Nothing left but to go for broke and hope there wasn't witch hunt for it. "Quite honestly headmaster I was hoping to be able to rely on secrecy and caution to last longer before I was discovered and I was hoping to have something figured out by then." Ozpin seemed thoroughly intrigued at what Max was saying. At least Max had his attention with the truth. "I'm not from Remnant. I am from a planet called Earth and given how I got here I couldn't tell how far from home I am or even what direction it's in." Ozpin's blinked twice in surprise for a moment. So he could be surprised. "A bold claim. I assume that you have some way to prove it?" Max nodded and brought his right hand in front of him with the palm up. Spark promptly flashed into existence floating just above Max's hand. The Ghost turned to face Ozpin, "Hello headmaster." Spark said politely spinning his front four tetrahedral facets around his core in the simulation of a wave. "My name is Spark and I believe that I can help my Guardian provide the proof that can validate what has been said so far." Ozpin blinked once before responding. "Do tell." "I should warn you that even the short version of our story will likely take some considerable time to tell." Ozpin waved his hand dismissively. "Given the situation, any of my other meetings can be pushed back for you tell your tale." "We must ask that you only share this information with those you trust absolutely." Max intervened upon the mention of others. "I mean no offense when I say this, but if people have difficulty accepting the faunas, how will they react to an alien?" Ozpin nodded seriously. He understood the risk that was being taken by trusting him with this knowledge. "A fair and wise request. Rest assured that your secret is safe with me." Max nodded his thanks then turned his head to Spark. "Take it away."

A light shot out of Spark's eye expanding to create a holographic image of the Solar system above Ozpin's desk. "I suppose that I should start from the beginning. Approximately two thousand years ago Earth had recently managed to successfully land people on Mars." As Max spoke Earth and Mars were highlighted appropriately to allow the headmaster to follow along with the story. "What we found there was completely unexpected." The image shifted to a show a still image of the Traveler. "The Traveler. A benevolent celestial being that blessed humanity with its knowledge. When humanity found the Traveler it was terraforming Mars, making it livable. Venus and Mercury went through the same terraforming not long after and when it visited Earth, humanity's Golden Age truly began. Human lifespan tripled and with the help of the Traveler, our technology and knowledge expanded and grew at an amazing rate. For five hundred years, what would have taken centuries or even millennia was accomplished in years. We began to expand and colonize the rest of the Solar system. But the Traveler had an enemy. This enemy is only known as the Darkness. Its armies attacked and the age we know as the Collapse began. We fought the Darkness to the best of our ability but the colonies were wiped out and humanity was pushed to the brink of extinction. Our last survivors took refuge under the Traveler and when it seemed that humanity's existence had come to an end the Traveler did something unexpected." Ozpin was practically at the edge of his seat, but still managed to maintain a calm façade. "The Traveler sacrificed itself and in doing so it forced the Darkness back to the edge of our solar system. In the Traveler's dying breath, it created the Ghosts." Max motioned towards Spark as the image once again shifted to show several Guardians standing alongside their Ghosts. "We were made to seek out our Guardians, people that were capable of wielding the Traveler's Light and continuing the fight against the forces of the Darkness. The Collapse spanned a period of roughly 1200 years and for the past three hundred years we have fought in a losing war, but at least now it's a war and not a slaughter. Only recently have we actually been able to push back the Darkness' armies. The Vex's Dark Heart in the Black Garden was destroyed and Atheon was defeated in the Vault of Glass. We've managed to kill two hive Gods and have broken almost every Fallen house's command structure." As Spark finished his story Ozpin leaned forward to place his elbows on his desk and clasp his hands in front of his face in thought. "An impressive and tragic tale to be certain, but it does not explain how the two of you managed to find yourselves on Remnant." Spark went on to play Max's helmet logs of the mission that had resulted in their arrival on Remnant, starting with Max fighting his way to the Cabal group that had been messing with the gate that had pulled them into the Mars vault. The video ended shortly after the point where Max had landed.

By the time the video had ended it was early evening. Ozpin was quite confident that he could count Max and Spark as allies but had one last question for them before he made any decision to act. "As I understand it, you encountered a creature of Grimm on your way here correct?" Max thought this question was somewhat odd but answered nonetheless. "Correct sir. I believe it was what say is called a beowolf." Ozpin turned to face Spark specifically now, "and you say that you managed to scan the creature before you killed it? I'll admit our knowledge of the Grimm is a bit limited given that studying them up close difficult while they are still alive and impossible when they are dead. I would appreciate your take on them." Spark's facets swiveled around his core for a moment as he seemed to think how to best respond. "I'm afraid that I am not able to add much more than what you already know. They reek of the Darkness I can say for sure. It's nothing like what we faced on Earth though. This is far more primitive than say something like the technology worshipping Fallen, but with that primitive state comes a ferocity that even the most feral Hive coven would be not able to match." Ozpin nodded in appreciation for the Ghost's insight. Ozpin turned his attention back toward both members of the duo. "I suppose that the last point of business that I must discuss with you today is to ask what you will do now." Neither Max nor Spark were expecting Ozpin to simply let them go and were unsure how to respond as they looked at each other for a moment. "I was under the impression that was something that you would be deciding headmaster, given the situation." Max replied honestly. Ozpin smiled. "I am not inclined to try to keep you under my control with the knowledge you have shared today. I said that your secret was safe with me and I meant it. I would however like to offer you a position at this school." Max was beyond surprised. What reason did Ozpin have to offer him a job here? Ozpin seemed to read Max's mind. "I pride myself on running the school that has earned the reputation of being the best combat school on Remnant. This school has earned that reputation by hiring the best, regardless of their background; human, faunas, rich, poor, and if you will accept alien too." Ozpin said with a smirk. "I have seen firsthand thanks to Spark you are a very skilled fighter. I believe that Ms. Goodwitch's combat classes would see you as a boon if you were to join as an assistant instructor. In all other classes you would be amongst the other students as a way of learning about Remnant." Max hesitated for a moment. He wasn't sure what to say. "Please do not feel rushed into this decision. I understand it is no small thing." Ozpin said mistaking Max's hesitation. Max looked at Spark who returned the looked before pitching slightly forward and leveling again in a form of nod. Max smiled and turned his attention back to the headmaster. "I think that we will accept your offer headmaster. What would be required of us?" Ozpin was glad that the two had accepted but there was one matter that needed to be taken care of before Max could be an assistant combat instructor. "That would be up to Ms. Goodwitch to decide however there is a test that you must perform before you can truly be considered a student of Beacon Academy." Ozpin said with an almost evil grin on his face. "For now though I can show you to your temporary quarters, seeing as it almost night already. I suggest you get your rest tonight. I have a feeling you will need it." Max and Spark shared a concerned look before joining Ozpin in the elevator. What could he possibly have planned?

 **A/N:**

 **Alright then guys I know that was a bit of a slow chapter, but fret not. I've got chapter 4 in the works already and so far it's plenty exciting. Again I want to apologize for this chapter taking so long to come out. I promise chapter 4 won't take a month to come out. As always any thoughts, comments, questions, and suggestions are welcomed. Until next time.**

 **-Stalkorc**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:*-**

 **Hey guys I'm back again with chapter 4 and as promised we have a bit more action this time. So I still felt kinda bad about how long it took me to get chapter three out, and I wanted to make up for it by getting this one out a bit early. Also I decided to try out slightly longer chapters. I would love to know what you all think about the format.**

 **DISCLAIMER:**

 **I do not own RWBY or Destiny. They are owned by Rooster Teeth and Bungie respectively.**

Chapter 4: Initiation pt2

Max awoke feeling better rested than he ever had in a long time. Ozpin had said that this was only a guest bed but Max had grown used to cots on missions and his bed back at the Tower, and those rooms had been built with the intention of storing many Guardians in one place, not for comfort. Comparing the two, Max felt like he had just slept on a cloud. **[Ready for whatever Ozpin has planned for us?]** "Definitely. I feel great." Max said as he began stretching to help wake up. Spark shimmered into the room above the queen sized bed in the room that had been given to the pair. The guest rooms even had their own bathroom attached in the rooms. After a quick shower. Max felt ready for Ozpin's test.

Ozpin had given Max one of Remnant's communication devices, a scroll he had called it. Spark simply kept it digitized in his inventory where he could monitor any messages it received. Apparently Ozpin wanted to meet Max at the Beacon cliffs for the test. After a quick breakfast, Max found himself up at the top of a cliff standing on what looked to be some form of launch pad listening to Ozpin explain the parameters of the test. "Normally we send all of the students in the incoming year out but this will be your challenge alone." Ozpin stopped his speech noticing the Max had not donned the armor that Qrow had first described but was rather was once again wearing his Beacon t-shirt and jeans. "Forgive me but I had expected you to be wearing your combat gear." Max chuckled he had let Spark take one last look at his armor to make sure that it had been fully repaired from their arrival on Remnant. "Just getting some last minute touch ups. Are the cameras off?" Ozpin looked like he was going to try to play coy with the subject. "Ruby told me that the first years have their initiation broadcast live to the school so I'm assuming that the same is being done for this." Ozpin smiled. "I see. The cameras will go live when you leave the cliff." Max nodded. "In that case, Spark if everything looks ok, do you mind helping me get dressed for the occasion?" **[Anything special you want to make it look good for the camera?]** _Nothing too fancy for now. Let's stick with something we know works. I'll need Shadow Price and keep the Matador and Raze Lighter prepped. And if you want to make it look good then let's use a bit of shock and awe shall we?_ **[Striker?]** _You know it._ Max spread his feet a bit wider than shoulder width apart and moved his arms out a bit from his sides. Suddenly a shower of shimmering light engulfed the titan and moments later the light was gone and Max was left standing clad once again in his heavy armor with Shadow Price mag locked to his back. Max lightly rocked back and forth on his feet, mentally preparing himself and just overall happy to be back in what he knew. "An impressive display." Ozpin said slightly amused at how relaxed the titan's movements had suddenly become now that he was back in his armor. "Your objective will be to find a temple to the north housing several various relics. Your objective will be to retrieve one of those relics and return here. Be warned there will be plenty of Grimm between you and your objective, normally there would be a large group of students in the forest with you to divide the attention of the Grimm, this obviously will not be the case during your test." Max nodded all business. "Head north to the temple, retrieve a relic, and return here, shouldn't be a problem." "In that case good luck." There was a soft click under his feet and suddenly Max was airborne above the Emerald Forest.

In the main dining area of Beacon Academy all the tables had been moved into a nearby storage room and the students had all gathered to watch the introduction of the student that apparently would also serve as the new assistant combat instructor. Ruby and her sister Yang stood together watching the screen alongside their new teammates, Weiss and Blake. With the four stood Jaune, Nora, Pyrrha, and Ren, the individuals that had aided team RWBY in initiation and then been formed into team JNPR. "Whoa, check out that crazy armor!" Jaune said somewhat jealously. "I've never seen armor like that before. It almost looks more like a robot from a science fiction film than a suit." Pyrrha said in agreement with her partner. "You know I'm not sure what I was expecting Max's combat clothes to look like when we met him, but it certainly wasn't something this cool." Ruby said to her sister. "Wait, you know him? How would you know him?" Weiss asked the younger girl in a surprised tone bordering on accusatory. Ruby seemed to shrink back slightly Weiss had still not quite come to terms with Ruby being made leader of their team and Ruby did not want to cause any more issues than there needed to be. Yang came to her sister's rescue as she stared at the screen, not noticing her sister's plight. "Yeah Rubes and I ran into him a couple weeks back, but we only talked for like a minute cause he said he had somewhere to be." "Strange that he has not moved to stop his fall yet." Blake said studying the display with a critical eye. Just as she finished her statement, a strange aura appeared all over the Max's armored figure and his decent slowed greatly and allowed him to land gently on the ground. "How did he do that?" Ruby asked in awe. The others around her were too glued to the screen to notice her question.

 _Alright Spark did you get enough of a scan to figure out where we need to go?_ **[Of course I did. You didn't just bring me along for my good looks did you?]** Spark said in a fake hurt tone. Max rolled his eyes as a waypoint appeared on his display. "Fine stupid question" Max said taking off towards his objective at a light jog. Max made no attempt to be quite this time. Part of the point of this exercise was to show what Max could do, and that would not happen if Max spent his time avoiding the enemy. Max had been itching for a proper fight for a while now. Sitting still for the past weeks just did not feel right to him as a titan and he felt right at home charging into enemy lines again, as any titan should. Max moved into a small clearing in the forest. A pack of six beowolves had taken notice of Max's approach and turned to face him, snarling. Max didn't bother to stop as his opponents tried to stare him down. Rather he increased his speed to a full on sprint straight at the pack's alpha that stood nearly one and half times the height of the rest of the pack. The alpha howled angrily, spurring the other five around it into action as it led the charge at Max.

Back at Beacon, the students looked on as what was likely to be the first of many encounters was about to begin. "What is he doing? Why has he not drawn his weapon? It's obviously meant to be used from a distance, so why is he just running at them?" Weiss asked failing to understand the titan's tactic. How could someone that was supposed to be a combat instructor be even more reckless than Ruby? At least the dolt was smart enough to draw her weapon when she threw caution to the wind. "No wait." Jaune said looking closely at the screen. "Does he look like he's... glowing to anybody else?" The others took a second look at the screen and noticed that in fact he was. Max looked like there was some form of energy amassing right in front of him with small waves of it falling off and behind him.

Max could feel the Arc energy coursing around him and continued to charge after the alpha. Max and the alpha closed to within three meters of each other. Max unleashed the energy that he had been storing up within him into one savage attack. He threw himself with all his might at the alpha as he channeled all of the Arc Light that he had built up into his body. The three-meter gap between Max and his target was closed almost instantly by Max as he placed his right shoulder directly under the rib cage of the alpha. The creature was lifted completely off of its feet. Shortly after impact with the alpha. Max planted his feet and came to a sudden stop, effectively throwing the alpha to the other side of the clearing. The alpha let out a surprised whine as it flew and crashed through a tree trunk, then rolled up against another tree where it let out one last pathetic whimper before slumping over, dead. The five remaining beowolves turned around to once again face Max but this time hesitated when they saw what had happened to their leader. Max smirked in his helmet. It seemed that no matter the enemy, a good old-fashioned shoulder charge could still work wonders for breaking their lines. Max drew his weapon and opened fire on the beowolves. Max learned that while the Grimm were ferocious, they lacked one crucial element that even the lowest of Max's other foes had, armor. One never even knew what happened as three successive rounds punctured its head. Another danced to the barking of Max's rifle before the remaining three were able to reach Max's position. Max ducked under a vicious swipe from the first Grimm to reach him. Before the second beowolf could reach him, Max fired a round into each of its kneecaps, immediately sending it to the ground. The third beowolf hesitated a moment longer and had hoped to allow its pack mates to distract Max before it came in to finish him. Max placed his rifle back onto his back and focused his Arc Light into his right fist. As the creature dove for Max with its jaws open in an attempt to end Max instantly. Max sent his fist into the creature's lower jaw and unleashed all of the voltage he had stored into the Grimm, disintegrating it entirely. Max turned back to face the first beowolf that had its left arm extended toward Max in an attempt to grab him and bring him to the ground as it leapt at him. Max grabbed the beowolf's wrist with his right hand. Max's left hand grabbed the creature's chest. Max's left hand kept the creature suspended in the air as his right hand flipped it over his head. Max slammed the Grimm on its back onto the downed beowolf. Max pressed his boot onto the creature's chest as he reached back to once again grab Shadow Price. Max emptied the magazine of Shadow Price into the two beowolves trapped beneath his boot.

 **[When you're done playing with the wildlife we do still have an objective to accomplish here.]** Spark said, amused that Max had decided to engage the beowolves at close range rather than simply pick them off from a distance. At least Max had taken to heart Spark's advice about putting on a bit of a show. "I thought this is what you wanted." Max said, turning back to continue towards the ruined temple. "First you want me to make it look good for the camera and now I'm taking too long?" Max shook his head exasperated with his Ghost and once again was jogging.

In Beacon's dining hall, the general mood of the room was impressed. "Uh, did he just kill an alpha with nothing but his shoulder?" Jaune asked, slightly intimidated now by the thought that the person responsible for such a feat would soon be involved in combat classes. "I got the impression that he was strong, but I've got to admit that was... _shocking._ " Yang chimed in with a grin on her face. The rest of team RWBY collectively face-palmed. They had not yet been a team for even a week and everyone was already at wit's end with Yang's puns. A quota was going to need to be set for the sake of everyone's sanity. "Was that electricity his semblance?" Jaune asked, opting to ignore team RWBY's troubles. "It could be. If it is it is a powerful one for sure, but I've never heard of a semblance quite like that before." Pyrrha answered and seemed deep in thought. If that was his semblance, why would he use it so soon? Semblances required one to tap into their aura reserves to use. The only people that could afford to use them so freely were people with semblance like Weiss or Ruby that required very little aura to use or like Jaune who had very large aura reserves. It certainly did not appear that Max's semblance would have an insignificant drain on his aura. Could it be that he relied on his armor to provide defense while he focused his aura into his semblance? If that was the case Pyrrha could see Max being a very powerful opponent in the combat arena.

Max had only just made it to the edge of the clearing when his motion tracker lit up indicating something approaching from ahead. Likely whatever it was, it had been attracted by the sounds of battle. Max drew his Shadow Price as he left the clearing behind him and once again was stepping his way through a light underbrush. Max had been expecting to run into a straggler from the pack of beowolves that he had just defeated. Instead Max found himself face to face the a much larger Grimm, in the shape of what looked like a bear. "Spark what is this thing?" Max asked with his rifle trained on the beast's head as it stood on its hind legs and issued a challenging roar. **[It's called an ursa. Obviously its bigger and stronger than the beowolves you've faced up till this point, but it also seems to be slower and less maneuverable. I'd recommend trying to stay behind it if you can. Its hide also seems to be significantly thicker so you'll want to concentrate your fire.]** "Got it." Max said processing his Ghost's words as a plan began to form. As far as Max was concerned, this ursa was another member of the Cabal, its tactics would assume that its weight and size gave it the advantage. Like the Cabal, Max would make this ursa reconsider that assumption.

"Now we'll see what he can do against an opponent that he can't just run over." Weiss said. His approach may have worked against those beowolves, but it had been sorely lacking in finesse. Who was this Max character anyway? Pyrrha Nikos was the four-time winner of Mistral's biggest combat tournament and she was starting out on the same level as her fellow first years. Weiss had never even heard of Max and at just a year older he had somehow been raised to the level of assistant combat instructor? Something was not right about this and Weiss was determined to find out what it was about Max that he was given special treatment. Ruby on the other hand was excited to see what else Max could do. "Yeah." The younger girl added. "The way he handled those beowolves was so _cool._ I want to see what he does against this ursa." The room went quite as the screen displayed Max beginning the battle by opening fire on the creature's head. The ursa flinched from the first impact and quickly brought its paws up in front in a defensive gesture to save itself from further harm. Weiss scoffed. There was no denying that Max's weapon was powerful, but regardless it would take a lot more than _that_ to bring down an ursa. Max seemed to notice that his rounds were having no effect and switched tactics. Max kept firing at the ursa but used his left hand to throw something at the ursa. Max stopped firing and took the time to reload. When the ursa felt the bullets stop, it threw its arms behind itself and gave an enraged roar at Max. Just as the beast went down on all fours to quickly close the gap between it and the source of its rage, a brilliant blue flash went off between its front paws. The ursa was knocked back onto its hind legs again before eventually stumbling backwards and tripping onto its back. The ursa's body was smoking slightly from some of its fur being singed by the untold voltage that had coursed through its body. The ursa oddly did not move to get back up immediately as Weiss expected. Ursai were known for being tenacious. Instead the beast just shook its head violently and scratched at its face like it had suddenly been blinded. Weiss realized that was exactly what had happened. The grenade Max had thrown was not meant to kill the ursa, but to blind it. Max began walking up to the creature and move around to the head, now brandishing a shotgun that Weiss had never noticed before. Could that be his rifle's other form? It would make sense why it hit so hard if the weapon was only meant to be used from a distance. Max reached the head of the ursa just as it seemed to get its bearings again. Before it could even roll over however Max fired his shotgun once and the now headless ursa slumped back down, already starting to fade away. Weiss wouldn't admit it but the she was somewhat impressed with how little effort it had taken Max to defeat the ursa. That feeling quickly changed to one of annoyance. All that she had seen so far was that he had an impressive bag tricks that came in handy in a few situations and had not yet seen any noteworthy skill from Max. Weiss had personally designed her rapier, Myrtenaster, to be the epitome of versatility, so what _was_ it that separated him from the rest of the students.

"Better?" Max asked with grin as he placed his Matador 64 shotgun back onto his back. **[Meh. I have notes.]** "Of course you do." Max chuckled. "Everyone's a critic." Max decided that he had wasted enough time and took off at a more purposeful run towards the temple. A few minutes later Max emerged from the forest to find an open plain. On the other side Max could see a grey, stone, circular pad built into the ground. It was obvious that there had once been more to the structure. On the opposite side of the pad there were pillars that had crumbled an untold number of years ago. Max felt a pang of anger at the sight. _I guess it doesn't matter where you go. The Darkness still rends and destroys what the Light creates._ **[Well, on the other side of that coin, now it doesn't matter where you go. There will always be Guardians to stand between the Darkness and the innocents.]** Spark said calmly into Max's head, trying to help his Guardian. As Max approached the circular platform he saw that there were several waist height pillars that clearly were not as old as their surroundings. Some of the pillars had small objects on them that Max assumed were the relics while others were empty, likely the relics that had been taken during the first years' initiation had not yet been replaced. "Chess pieces?" Max asked. **[What did you expect? If there were actual relics of the past to be found here, they would be sending archeologists with armed escort to recover them. Not a bunch of trigger happy kids trying to earn their place in a school.]** Max shrugged. "So which one should we grab then?" **[Do you think they have some special meaning behind them?]** "If so, I guess I should go for what best represents me?" Max asked wondering what piece he should grab. Max settled on a white knight piece, deciding that the knight's ability to quickly change tactics between offense and defense, as well as its usefulness at breaking an opponent's lines best represented Max's role as a titan. "Alright now we just need to make it back." Max said as he placed the piece inside a pouch on his belt so the cameras would not see Spark place it into his digital inventory. Max could see part of Beacon's cliffs from where he was and decided he would head in that direction rather than back through the forest, if for no other reason than Max didn't want to be surprised by another ursa.

Max came to a stop at the base of the cliff, where there was another, much larger temple built partially into the side off the cliff wall. Before Max could begin climbing his way up the cliff; however, he first had to make his way across a large canyon. It appeared that at one point the temple had spanned the gap as there were remnants of bridges across. Closer inspection showed that while time had definitely taken its toll on the structure, a fair bit of the damage the temple had sustained was done recently. "Of course getting back would be the hardest part." Max complained as he was trying to judge what jumps he could make and what parts of the structure would be able to support his weight. An ear splitting screech and the sound of some of the stone pillars behind Max being shattered answered his complaint. **[I seriously am going to kill you the next time I hear you say something that stupid.]** Spark deadpanned. A giant scorpion came lumbering out of the shelter it had been hiding in and set its six eyes on Max's form. The creature was covered in thick plates of bony armor and it was clear that Max's rifle would do nothing to the creature's armor. It had two large pinchers that looked powerful enough to snap a person in half with relative ease, and Max was not very interested in learning if his armor would be enough to save him should he find himself in the creature's grasp. The thing was also sporting a large golden stinger that hung lazily above its armored head but looked like it could be even more dangerous than the claws. Spark piped up in Max's head. **[Apparently this thing is called a deathstalker, appropriate name if you ask me, and this looks to be quite a large specimen. The data I've been able to find suggests that they tend to use their claws to defend themselves and the stinger on its back can deliver lightning fast attacks.]** "Well this may be a bit interesting." Max said more to himself than to Spark.

The members of sister teams, RWBY and JNPR worriedly watched the scene on the monitors unfold. Jaune leaned towards his partner at his side, "I thought you said the deathstalker we fought was unusually big. How is there already another just as big back there?" Pyrrha thought about his question but it was Weiss who answered. "Well, deathstalkers are thought to mate for life. I suppose this one could have followed the tracks to where we killed its mate." "Oh great, so we delivered a giant, angry, widowed deathstalker to the new teacher. Talk about pranking the new guy." Yang joked. "Shush!" Weiss hissed out annoyed with her company. "I only answered Jaune's question so everyone would be quiet. I want to see what happens." Weiss turned her attention back to the screen and narrowed her gaze as Max seemed to finish studying his opponent. At least he had finally found _something_ that he would not carelessly throw himself at, and would actually think before he acted.

Max knew this fight was going to last longer than the others. According to Ozpin last night, despite their ferocious nature, it was actually possible for Grimm to learn as they aged. If the scars on the deathstalker's bone armor meant anything, this deathstalker had more than its fair share of years and battles to learn from. It would likely be too prepared for a simple to charge to yield anything other than a swift death for Max. Max did not want to give the deathstalker any time to realize that it had him trapped between it and the chasm behind Max. He ran to his right, circling around the deathstalker, careful to stay out its stinger's reach. Once Max had reversed his and the creature's positions, he fired a burst of rifle straight into its face. Max knew that his weapon would have no chance at puncturing the thick armor, but he wanted to gauge its reaction. It seemed that despite max's weapon posing no threat, the deathstalker would still listen to its instinctive self-preservation instincts. The creature's massive claws quickly raised to protect its face from Max's weapon. While the rounds bounced harmlessly off the thick claws, the action left the deathstalker effectively covering its eyes. _So it can attack or defend, but it doesn't look like it can do both well at the same time. Just means I need to keep it on its heels and find something to do about that stinger._ Max backed away from his enemy to allow himself some space and took stock of the area around him. It seems that the shelter the deathstalker had burst out of still had some columns that were left standing at about a story tall. One of those could prove useful. Max reached back as he channeled his Light. Raze-lighter's hilt materialized in Max's hand and he "drew" the jagged bladed sword, making it appear as though it was stored in a sheath built into his armor. Max held the meter-and-half long blade in a two handed grip in front of him and he poured his Light into the weapon. The blade burst into flames before him and Max could feel their hunger. _With your own hands you forged the mighty Raze-Lighter. Now take it in hand and feed its flames._ Max remembered the Crucible handler, Lord Shaxx's, voice in his head. Max switched his grip to hold the blade off-center to the right as he charged the deathstalker, aiming for the beast's left side.

Max knew that in order to take out the deathstalker he would need to either take out its eyes or the stinger. The creature would likely be able to quickly get its claws between its face and any attack Max made but would struggle to be as quick to do the same for its stinger. The deathstalker's right claw came across its body, straight for Max's neck trying to end the conflict before it began. Max easily slapped it away with the flat of Raze-Lighter and kept charging. Max swung his sword toward the joint of the front left leg of the deathstalker but only managed to drag the blade across the thick armor of its left claw. Max made a quick half-spin to his left and leaned back slightly to narrowly avoid the golden stinger coming for his heart almost faster than he could react. Perfect. In an instant, Max poured his Light into Raze-Lighter and the blade became a roaring inferno. Max brought the blade in an upward one-handed strike with so much force that he brought himself nearly a meter off of the ground. The deathstalker's screeched in agony at the loss of its stinger as Max landed in a slight crouch to the creature's left. Max was not expecting to deathstalker to react as quickly as it did, and was not prepared for the creature to retaliate by swatting him away with the broad side of its claw. Max found himself sprawled in front one of the pillars of the ruined temple that was roughly 10 meters tall. Max quickly pushed himself back up onto his feet and prepared to face the deathstalker as it started to charge at him. Max was surprised at the speed that the creature was able to close the distance with him given that it had taken some time to turn in Max's direction. Max jumped and used his Lift to bring himself above the deathstalker and out of the danger of being trampled to death. Max began to draw out all of the Arc Light that he could muster and felt it course through his veins as he landed gently atop the pillar. The deathstalker screeched in rage at the prey that had wounded it and now sat safely out of its reach. Max jumped again as the deathstalker rammed the pillar and toppled it in an attempt to bring Max back into its reach. Max continued to channel all the Arc Light he could as he used his Lift once again to stay in the air as long as he could. The deathstalker looked around in confusion assuming that Max would have fallen with the pillar. _Well Spark you wanted it to look good. I'd say that this is about as flashy as it gets._ Max's lift cut out as he felt the Arc Light in his body nearly become too much for him to contain. No point in holding it back any further. The deathstalker looked up in time to see Max begin his decent towards it. Max's body had accumulated so much Arc Light that his whole body was glowing a brilliant blue with the electricity that was flowing freely across him, and he focused all of it into his fists as he raised them above his head during his fall. The deathstalker screeched, unable to stop Max from impacting on its head. Max's feet landed just behind the creature's eyes and he brought his fists down with a thunderous explosion in the middle of its back. Max's feet impacted with the ground as the deathstalker disintegrated beneath him from the immeasurable amounts of Arc energy that passed through it. Max bent over at the waist and put his hands on his knees, panting. "In hind sight, perhaps that was a little too much power there. I think that might have been more juice than necessary." **[Well at least it looked good right?]** Spark joked as he sarcastically imitated Max's voice. "Just shut up." Max said suppressing his laughter. "We've got to get up to the top. I bet Ozpin is waiting for us."

Beacon's dining hall had become a mixture of cheers and expressions of awe at Max's display. "Wow! That was amazing! Did you see that?" Ruby exclaimed, unable to form much more rational thought. "Of course I saw it. How would anybody have missed that?" Weiss answered. Weiss had to admit, that was an impressive display of power. But other than a powerful semblance, and even that she was still currently questioning, Weiss had not seen anything that she thought was worth Max being elevated to a position above her. There was something off about him, and Weiss was determined to figure it out. "Oh come on Weiss, you're just jealous that he got to show off on his own and you had to run with the rest of us." Yang said with a grin. "That's not true I just don't understand what it is that makes him so special. How can you not be the least bit curious about that? Even Pyrrha was given the same initiation as us and is still a regular student like us. What could possibly set him so far apart that he wasn't?" JNPR could not help overhearing RWBY's conversation. Jaune and Pyrrha were casting sideways glances at the group, unsure of what to do. Nora seemed to be in her own happy world, and Ren remaining the ever stoic figure, seemed content to let the conversation run its course. "Well perhaps we should take it upon ourselves to meet our new instructor. Maybe if we do, we would see in him what others apparently do?" Pyrrha offered cheerfully hoping to diffuse the situation. Weiss only huffed in frustration. It was clear she was outnumbered in her opinion, but maybe meeting the newcomer would either answer her questions or the others would agree with her, either way, she was at least willing to admit that nothing would be solved arguing here. "Fine, and when we meet him you'll all see that I was right. Right now I have homework to get done." Weiss said walking back to the RWBY dorm room. Ruby and Yang shared a confused look. "Uh, Weiss you know that assignment that professor Oobleck gave us isn't due until next week right?" The elder sister questioned. "So? Just because I have to wait seven days to turn it in does not mean I have to wait six days to start it." The heiress called back over her shoulder. " You know Yang she does make a fair point. If we've got nothing to do for now we might as well at least get started on it." Ruby said, intentionally loud enough for Weiss' retreating form to hear. Ruby desperately wanted to earn the heiress' respect, if for no other reason than her team's cohesiveness would suffer as long as Weiss questioned Ruby's ability to lead it. "Well guys, it is starting to get close to dinner time and they're going to need us to clear out of here to get set up, not to mention I bet the new instructor is going to be pretty tired after his initiation. How about we all agree to get a somewhat early night tonight and meet him tomorrow?" Jaune suggested, regaining control of his voice after the tension in the room died down somewhat. When nobody objected JNPR and the remnants of RWBY began making their way collectively back to their dorm rooms. Jaune may be behind his friends when it came to combat and classes, but sisters were devious creatures. Growing up with seven meant that Jaune was basically an expert at reading people, even though he would never admit it. If Jaune could tell anything from Weiss, whether Max knew it or not, he was in for an _interesting_ conversation tomorrow.

 **A/N:**

 **Alright everyone, I promised more action in chapter 4 and I hope I delivered on the expectations set. Like I said, I rushed this one out early to try to make up for the huge delay in chapter 3. From here on out updates will come out roughly once a week.** **As always any thoughts, comments, questions, and suggestions are welcomed. Until next time.**

 **-Stalkorc**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N:**

 **Hey guys I'll be honest I've been back and forth on how this chapter should go which is why it was delayed. It took me a while, but I finally got the chapter looking a way I'm happy putting my name on it. Also in response to a review, Chapter 5 is featuring proper paragraphs... hopefully. I'm still not an English major.**

Chapter 5: First Day of Class

Max was unsure what he was expecting for his first day as an official "student ", but it certainly wasn't to be interrogated by joint teams RWBY and JNPR, well in reality he enjoyed a pleasant conversation over breakfast with JNPR and most of RWBY while _Weiss_ interrogated him. Max was not used to the food that was so readily available here on Remnant, especially at Beacon. The Last City back on Earth, despite its large size and beauty was still in a perpetual state of war. Everything was rationed all the time. Very little was wasted on luxury, and apparently flavor, _any_ flavor, is considered a luxury when it comes to designing the Guardian's field nutrient packs. Max had just sat down with a plate full of eggs, bacon, toast, and fruit of all things. Fruit had become virtually extinct on Earth. Max had only just started eating when he was surprised by Ruby who seemed to appear out of nowhere. "Hi Max." Max had been given some basic information on the students that he would be assisting. He was familiar with Ruby's speed but it was another thing to see it in action or _not_ see it in action was a better way to put it. "Hi Ruby. You know you really shouldn't startle people like that." Max said with a smile.

"Ruby you dolt!" Max and Ruby both turned to see a short girl with snow white hair pulled into an off-center pony tail standing with her arms crossed and staring pointedly at Ruby. Based on her hair and her response to Ruby's antics, Max guessed that he was looking at Weiss Schnee. Weiss was flanked by Yang whom Max recognized from earlier, which the meant the girl to Weiss' left was Blake Belladonna. Yang stood with a cheesy grin and waved casually at Max. Blake stood patiently waiting to be given a reason to move. Her golden eyes seemed to linger on Max just long enough to give a polite nod, before falling back to the book she had with her. He realized she was trying to study him without making it _look_ like she was studying him. Weiss continued to fume, "You said you would introduce us, not take off as soon as you saw him." Ruby smiled and rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. "Well to be fair if you all care to join me, she still can." Max came to Ruby's defense with friendly smile. For some reason Weiss only seemed more annoyed at that. _Strange._

A few minutes later, RWBY had gone through the line and returned to sit at the rectangular table with Max. JNPR had also joined in. As it was now Max sat at the far left corner of the table to his right were Pyrrha Nikos, Juane Arc, Lie Ren, and Nora Valkyrie. Directly across from Max sat Ruby. Moving right, Weiss seemed to be working something through her head, Yang still had her grin that seemed to never quit, and finally Blake continued to silently take her measure of the titan over the top of her novel. It was obvious all of them had questions that they wanted answered. Max was content to eat while they figured what they wanted to ask first. "So Max," It seemed Weiss was the first to organize her thoughts. "Just what exactly is your position here? Professor Ozpin was not very specific." "Basically it's the same as all of yours, Weiss." Max answered. "I'm first a year student same as all of you. The only difference is Ozpin thought my combat experience was above that of the average first year and I would better serve as an assistant in our combat class."

Max correctly assumed that she had an issue with the fact that his talent on the battlefield had elevated him above her. He hoped that by saying he was still basically at the same level as her he would pacify her somewhat. Unfortunately his words only seemed to frustrate the girl further. Max had an unsure look as he switched his gaze between Weiss and the rest of the table's occupants, each only managed to shrug in response. It seemed that no one at the table had any real idea yet of just what made the heiress tick. "Well at least tell us what academy taught you to fight before coming to Beacon." Max smiled. _It looks like the show I put on was good._ **[Yeah. Maybe it was a little too good. I get the sense you're going to have a hard time throwing her off your trail.]** "I didn't go to an academy before Beacon. Most of what I know about fighting I learned either on my own or from a mentor back home." Blake seemed to take a certain interest at that. "Where exactly are you from?" Weiss asked narrowing her eyes. **[Oh I'd like to know this too.]** Spark said amused. "I came from a small remote city. It's quite far from here so I doubt you've heard of it or will find it on any map." This time Ren seemed interested. "A city away from the main kingdoms? Are the Grimm not a threat?" Max's response was almost automatic. "The Grimm will always be a threat but the City does a good job of protecting itself from the creatures of Darkness."

"So if you grew up there, is that where you got that awesome armor and those awesome weapons? Can we see your weapons? Can you get one made for me?" Ruby asked becoming more excited with her questions that she literally started bouncing on her seat. Max couldn't help but chuckle. "You're a fan of weapons I see." Ruby could only smile sheepishly as a resounding, "YES!" came from the rest of the table. "Speaking of your armor," Yang started, hoping to lead the conversation away from weapons. With Ruby present, they could end up at that table until the end of time. "Why are you wearing it now? If your trying to stand out you aren't exactly inconspicuous without it." **[Because you become a socially inept klutz without it.]** _Quiet you._ "Well we do have combat class as our first class and look at me." Max leaned away from the table slightly and spread his arms out. "I'm sure you can imagine it takes a while to get this on properly." Yang had to concede the point. Weiss looked like she was ready to begin another round of questioning. It was not meant to be as just as she opened her mouth to speak, the school's bell rang out, indicating that first classes would begin in 6 minutes.

Max grabbed his plate that had long been empty and stood from the table. "Well looks like the bell waits for no one here in Beacon." It was obvious that Weiss wanted to continue her interrogation, but there was no way that she would allow herself to be late to class. The group of nine placed their dishes in the receptacle and began making their way to the arena where class would be held. As they walked the conversation switched to classes. "So Max, since we've now got a man on the inside can you give us an idea of what combat classes are going to be like?" Yang asked, nudging him with her elbow. "I admit I am curious what classes here will be like." Pyrrha said as she walked next to her partner. It seemed like wherever Juane went, Pyrrha would not be far away. "Well I did have a meeting with Ms. Goodwitch about classes, and it's still her class. For the most part her lessons will focus on growing as individuals and I will assist in lessons involving team dynamics. I'm not at liberty to say much more, but I can tell you that today I'll mainly be running the class."

The group reached the door to the arena and Max moved ahead to hold it open for the other eight to move through. "Well I believe this is where part ways for now." The group moved to the right to find a place among the rows of seats that went around the circular arena. Max moved to his left and made his way up to the back stairs that lead down to the locker rooms that connected to the arena floor. Once Max was in the locker room and safe from the view of the others, Max used his Light to summon his helmet into has hands and tucked it under his right arm and felt the familiar weight of Raze Lighter on his back and his Wormwood sidearm on his left hip. **[So do you think you're ready to teach a bunch of super powered teenagers how to fight?]** "Well I've helped train plenty of new Guardians so this can't be that much harder than that right?" **[Ha! Somehow I feel like that's not going to be enough.]** "I killed a Vex god in the Black Garden and helped kill two Hive gods?" **[I'll say something nice at your funeral.]** Max rolled his eyes and walked out to meet Ms. Goodwitch in the center of the arena. _I'll be fine._

Max stood next to the professor. The bell rang out and Goodwitch began. "Students, welcome once again to first year combat class. As I'm sure that all of recognize our new addition to class. Max will be here to assist you in your out of class combat studies and will assist in running team oriented class periods. As I understand it, today's lesson will need the full class period so know that I expect you to show the same respect to Max as I expect you to show to me." With that, Goodwitch began walking off to the side of arena and Max moved to take her place in the center. Max gave a slight turn to bring all of the students into his view. "Hello everyone, as Ms. Goodwitch said I will be your new assistant combat instructor. Normally this would be the part where we go through a long introduction process; however, where I'm from we believe that the best way to meet new people is in the arena. May I please have team RWBY make their way down?" RWBY looked somewhat surprised for being called out but quickly began making their way towards the back stairs. Weiss had a look on her face like she had something to prove. _Well at least there's no question that she'll take this seriously. Now the hard part will be walking the fine line of making sure that I'm not too tough on them and not taking it too easy._

RWBY was soon stood in the arena with Max on the other side about 20 meters away. While the team was still not certain why all of them had been called down considering matches were usually a one-on-one affair, they all had begun mentally prepping for a fight. Ruby had taken to giving her weapon, Crescent Rose a final inspection. Weiss was moving through different stances, ensuring that her footwork would be perfect. Yang had started pumping up with some light shadow boxing and Blake was doing some light stretches. Max decided to let to let them continue as he began to explain the day's lesson. "Even though normally combat classes are focused on building the individual's strengths, when you're out on assignment it will be as a team. The fact that you've been accepted into Beacon means your skill is undeniable but there will be times where your skill alone is not enough and you will need to rely on your teammates. Today's lesson will be learning to fight effectively with your team to bring down a hard target, aka me." Max said with a smile as he snapped his helmet on with a hiss and reached back to draw Raze Lighter from his back. Above the arena the Aura readouts of all the combatants could be seen. Max looked over his right shoulder to nod at Ms. Goodwitch and she shut the lights above the seats off, leaving the only illumination in the room above the arena floor. "The match will begin in 3, 2, 1, begin."

Max charged toward the center of the group with Raze Lighter in a one handed grip in his right hand. Blake was the first to react and snapped to firing Gambol Shroud in its pistol form at Max. Her aim was true, but the rounds were ineffective against the titan's armor as they pinged harmlessly off of his armor, not even triggering his Light barrier to protect him. Yang punched the air in front of her with Ember Celica and Max was barely able to duck under the explosive shell in time. _Probably want to avoid those._ Max had crossed halfway to the team, and was in the center of the arena by the time Ruby had spun Crescent Rose and dug the tip of the scythe into the ground to take aim with the sniper rifle. Before Ruby could fire though, Weiss seemed to take the matter into her own hands. Weiss used an Aura powered lunge to cross the gap to Max almost immediately. If it weren't for the surprised look on Ruby's face as she quickly brought her aim off her teammate's back, Max would have believed that Ruby taking aim at Max had been an intentional feint. Max was no stranger to being on the receiving end of a surprise attack and was able to angle the blade of Raze Lighter to send Weiss' strike sliding along the blade above Max. _No reason to take it easy here. That was a careless strike._ Max twisted his wrist so Myrtenaster's blade would be caught in Raze Lighter's jagged edge, then gave a hard pull from left to right as he planted his feet in place. The result was to force Weiss to either allow herself to be disarmed or reverse her direction and be pulled in front of the titan. Weiss decided releasing her grip was too great a risk and followed Max's pull. As soon as Max saw Weis enter his view again he side-stepped to the left and continued his charge at the rest of the group. Weiss realized too late the point was not to leave her unbalanced at the start of an engagement, rather the point had been to place Weiss in front of the next explosive shell Yang had fired. Weiss pitched forward as the shell impacted against her back and barely managed to keep her feet. By the time Weiss recovered and spun to face Max again he had made his way to the rest of the team.

Ruby had pulled Crescent Rose out of the floor and brought the blade of her scythe horizontally behind her as she lowered herself into a crouch, ready to spring into a flurry of strikes. Being Ruby's older sister meant Yang recognized the practiced stance. "Give Ruby some room." She ordered. Blake nodded in response. Max noticed Yang and Blake hanging back and quickly realized why. Ruby's scythe was coming at his midsection. Max instinctively jumped back and realized his mistake. Ruby never wanted the strike to land. The point had been to build momentum for a flurry of strikes that seemed to come from all directions at once. Max could keep up with the girl for the first few strikes, but was quickly forced to bring Raze Lighter's blade across his body with the tip of the blade in front of his left shoulder and the grip at his right hip. Max poured his Light into the blade and a shield of Solar Light came forth to ward off Ruby's onslaught. _I'm going to need to keep her on the defensive or this will go bad quick._ "NOW!" Max heard Yang shout as he heard her gauntlets fire simultaneously. Max kept Raze Lighter's guard between him and Ruby as he turned his head to see Yang above him with her right fist cocked back for a heavy blow. Max dropped Raze Lighter's guard and rolled to his left to avoid Yang. Ruby was fast enough to get a glancing blow on his right shoulder as he dove away. _Not bad. But then again I'm not surprised those two have a healthy idea of how to complement each other's fighting style._ Max spun in a quick 180 and saw _two_ Blakes coming at him. Max drew his sidearm lightning fast and fired a round at each of them. Blake learned the hard way that while Max's sidearm and Gambol Shroud's pistol form were roughly the same size, a Guardian's weapons packed a surprising punch. Blake's shadow clone vanished from view as the round went clean through and Blake grunted in surprise as the round impacted against her Aura and brought her leap to a halt. Max holstered Wormwood and brought Raze Lighter up as he heard the tell-tale whistle of Weiss' lunge. It seemed she was ready for round two. _At least this time she timed it to prevent me from following up against Blake._

Max and Weiss traded several slashes, thrusts, and jabs with neither able to land a hit. The target of each attack was always able to avoid, block, parry, or in Weiss' case place a defensive glyph in the way of each attack. Max was able to force enough movement and rotation in the battle to prevent the rest of the team from attacking without risking hitting Weiss. The heiress seemed determined to bring Max down by herself. _I don't know what her problem is, but it's like she's determined to prove she can beat me when she has to know she can't do it alone._ Even though Max had not yet landed a direct hit on the heiress, he had forced her to use her semblance to place a glyph between her and his blade at an increasing frequency. Each time she did she had to dip into her Aura reserves and at this point she was at about half while she had thus far been unable to force Max to use his Light to create Raze Lighter's guard. She may not be aware that Max could likely knock her Aura into the red and force her out of the fight at any point now that her Aura was low, but she had to realize that this was a war of attrition that she simply could not win. _No real choice now. If she's going to keep engaging alone like this, then she needs to learn to how to rely on her teammates. If her ego is the only thing that ends up bruised then I'll have done my job._ Max had helped instruct many new Guardians in his time. One of the least enjoyable lessons to teach was that sometimes your efforts alone, no matter how great they may be, aren't enough and you need to rely on your team to get the job done. As much as Max hated needing to drive this point home he knew it was always best to learn it in a practice setting rather than on assignment. Max blocked an overhead strike from Weiss and sent their clashed blades pointed to his right so the blades were pointed toward the ground. At the same time Max used his left hand to reach for Wormwood. Weiss' eyes grew wide as she saw the action. Myrtenaster was trapped between the floor and Raze Lighter's jagged edge. Weiss combined her semblance and some of her ice dust to fire an ice spike at Max's hand and knocked the sidearm from his grasp. Weiss smirked, but it was short lived. "WEISS, LOOK OUT!" Ruby warned too late. Weiss had been so focused on Max's sidearm she had not noticed that Raze Lighter's blade had set ablaze as Max channeled a large amount of Light into the blade. Max launched into the same one handed uppercut he had used to sever the deathstalker's stinger. Weiss could do nothing to stop the strike and even though Max put far less force and Light into this strike, both he and the heiress were sent into the air. Max landed in a light crouch while Weiss was sent sprawling away, her Aura still intact, but deep into the red which meant she had been eliminated from the match. Max felt the lesson had been learned and rather than continue the fight with the rest of team RWBY, he stood up straight and nodded to where he knew Ms. Goodwitch stood in the shadows. The lights immediately kicked on, signaling the end of the match. Ruby, Blake, and Yang all entered relaxed stances as well, confused at the sudden end to the combat but also sending concerned looks toward their downed teammate. Weiss just shakily brought herself up to a seated position.

Ruby moved to help but Max held his left hand up and she stopped to watch nervously. Max placed Raze Lighter on his back and offered his hand to Weiss. Weiss looked away for a moment and sat catching her breath before she was able to swallow her pride enough to accept Max's hand. Max gently pulled her to her feet and with obvious effort Weiss was able to stand upright. Max pulled off his helmet and fixed Weiss with a hard stare. "Ms. Schnee I stated before the lesson began that this would have to be a team effort. So why did you force the conflict into one where your team could not join in without risking striking you?" Max asked all business. "I didn't. You kept moving the fight so the others would not able to jump in." Weiss tried to defend herself. Max's stare only hardened and Weiss had to make an active effort to not flinch under its intensity. "Ms. Schnee, at the start of the match you nearly allowed yourself to be shot in the back by Ms. Rose and _did_ allow yourself to be shot in the back by Ms. Xiao Long, all during my attempt to get _past_ you. When we fought, I moved to make it difficult to be attacked from behind true, but not once did I force you to continue to engage. At any point you could have disengaged to allow your teammates a chance. Yet you did not." Weiss could no longer meet Max's gaze. There was nothing she could say in defense to that. "Think back. What was the one time my Aura was drained from taking a hit?" Weiss almost looked annoyed at such a simple question, but kept it from her face assuming he was making a larger point beyond the fact that Ruby had managed to score hit on an opponent that she could not. "Ruby managed to hit you." Max was glad Ruby was behind him and couldn't actually see the heiress as each word in that sentence seemed to a drive a blade deeper into Weiss's ego than the last.

Max nodded and kept his face serious. "When?" Weiss forced herself to meet his gaze again, but did so with a newfound respect for the titan. "When you rolled to get from between her and Yang." She answered more confidently. Max nodded again this time with a slight smile. "Correct." Max turned to address the whole team at once. "Ms. Rose and Ms. Xiao Long forced me into position where I could defend myself from one of them but not both. I choose to avoid Ms. Xiao Long's attack, thus Ms. Rose scored a hit." Max gestured at the half-sisters in turn with his left hand. Ruby smiled happily with hands clasped behind her back at the praise as Yang gave her sister thumbs up. "No doubt if I had not been able to surprise Ms. Belladonna with my sidearm I would have quickly found myself in another situation where I would be forced to allow one of them to score a hit." Max returned his attention back to Weiss but kept his arm outstretched with his palm up and gestured toward Yang with his hand. "The point was never to beat me Ms. Schnee. It wasn't even to hit me. I wanted to force you to work as a group to fight me." Max said in a gentler tone as he holstered the sidearm Yang had handed him after taking it from her sister who had been trying to discretely inspect the weapon. "I know you have only been a team for a short time. All I wanted to see was an active effort to work together. You need to be able to rely on your team in a practice setting so that relying on your team when it actually counts on assignment comes second nature. The sooner a team can rely on its members, the faster all the individuals can grow." Weiss looked down and sighed. "I don't think I can promise an immediate change, but I can promise to try." Weiss said confidently looking back up. "That's all I ask." Max stepped aside to let Weiss rejoin her team.

As RWBY made their way out of the arena, Max's voice rang out throughout the classroom. "Alright, I know that may have set a bit of a daunting precedent, but I feel like you all now have got a pretty good idea of what I'm looking for in this exercise. Team JNPR, you're up next." Max was unsure what to expect from JNPR. On one hand, they had Pyrrha Nikos who's claim to fame was winning the past four Mistral Combat Tournaments. On the other hand, they also had Jaune Arc. Max honestly had no idea how the boy had been accepted into the school. Jaune appeared to have no practical combat training, yet he had been named the leader of his team by Ozpin himself. Ren and Nora acted like they knew each other from before joining Beacon and would likely be experienced in fighting alongside each other. As it stood he would be facing fighter used to being a one-woman-army, a duo used to fighting together but likely not with more than that, and Jaune with no real experience to name; and the four of them are expected to come together to work as one unit. _Well, I suppose we'll see how this plays out._

By the end of class Max could say that he overall he was pleasantly surprised by how well the teams had performed. Baring the incident with RWBY all teams had showed a much higher aptitude for teamwork than most Guardian fireteams do this early. JNPR had shown a well above average amount of teamwork, but Pyrrha had a nasty habit of leaving herself over-exposed every time Max pressed his assault on Jaune. And speaking of Jaune, the boy had the mind of a seasoned tactician, but when it came to fighting, he looked like he needed someone to come tell him which end of the sword to swing at the enemy. Max had also been concerned about how well Ren and Nora would adjust to being part of a larger team. Typically when Guardians that were used to working as a duo were given a new fireteam leader, it took even longer than normal for the team to work together. _Remnant might be on to something by stressing teamwork so early. But to be fair the City never enlisted a bunch of hyperactive teenagers to fight its battles._ Max thought with a sad grin. He and Spark had both had time to come to terms with the fact they were never going home again, but that didn't mean one of them didn't miss Earth from time to time.

 **[Well all things considered I would still say that it's been a good day.]** Spark said trying to cheer his Guardian up. **[You got interrogated, then beat the hell out of your interrogator. You know normal things that assistant teachers do every day. See? You're already making an impact on this world.]** _Hey, that's not fair I did what I had to do. I didn't like doing it back on Earth and I certainly don't enjoy that here, but leaning on your teammates should be as instinctual as breathing when it comes to fighting the Darkness. Just because they're not the usual enemies we're used to doesn't mean the Grimm are anything to laugh at so I'm taking this seriously._ Max thought back determined.

 **[You know I always thought you meant that whole lean on your teammates thing figuratively, but I guess Weiss learned a lesson when she literally had to lean on Ruby to make it out of the arena.]** _Alright, fine I get it. So I went a little too far. I'll apologize later, but can we please just change the subject for now?_ **[Blake's a cat Faunas.]** _Wait what?_

 **A/N:**

 **And there we have it. As I said I had a hard time deciding where this chapter should go, so I'd really appreciate all the feedback I can get on this chapter. Sorry this took a while to come out.** **As always any thoughts, comments, questions, and suggestions are welcomed. Until next time.**

 **-Stalkorc**


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